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Monday, 8 December 2014

Learning to Offer Choices

*Disclaimer:
Strategies/techniques used in Riley World are ones that work for Riley and his
family and are not necessarily viable for other individuals/families.

Long,
long ago in a far away world lived a little boy named Riley. He was a sweet,
happy-go-lucky boy…*cue scratching sound of
vinyl record*…wait…ummm…that was as long
as things went his way.

One
of the biggest challenges for Riley and his family was communication. Acquiring
language was difficult for R. This led to a great deal of frustration and in
turn challenging behaviours (self-hitting, verbal outbursts and tic-like muscle
movements).

Along
came Riley’s Fairy Godmother and Mr. Brown (a Behavioural Consultant) who
worked with the family to help them understand the ways of Riley World. One of
the first strategies/techniques they recommended was to give R choices. They
said it would empower Riley to have some control over decision-making thereby
diffusing possible triggers for meltdowns. The parental units were somewhat
sceptical until they witnessed the positive results.

Sure
there were growing pains. Offering choices that would be acceptable to all
did not come easy at first…especially for the mother unit. In her
mind it was impractical to wear sandals/shorts in the winter. Pick one’s
battles indeed however in order to maintain peace and order in Riley World the
entire population would need to be in agreement.

Thus
began the evolution of the choices “game”.

·Initially
both choices would be things that Riley liked/wanted.

Eg. Do you
want to wear blue shorts or black shorts?

·Next
came one preferred choice; the
other…well…not.

Eg. Do you
want to wear blue shorts or blue pants?

Gradually
the mother unit caught on and with experience began to offer choices that would
not only broaden Riley’s acceptance of change but would also ultimately result
in an outcome that satisfied her. Hey. It was a technique that
worked well (for both R and J2) in
those early years. Eventually “Choices:
The Second Edition” was introduced.

Of course there was balking and verbal outbursts. Miracles
only happen on 34th Street my friends yet the meltdowns were reduced
significantly enough that persevere they did.

Years
passed. Meltdowns waned. The mother unit was hooked on this concept.

Fast
forward to 2014.

The
choices game is still in play but gone are the days when the mother unit was
able to outsmart Riley. This became
very apparent at the start of Operation IFO. Riley has developed negotiating
skills and shown signs of a typical teenage sloth (ie. you do it
for me even if it means having to choke down a hamburger).

4 comments:

Mine are the same really. Every time I think I have them figured out - know exactly how to find their "currency": they go and change it on me. ugh. then again, hubby says I do the same to him. but honestly, that's just fun. ;)